Effects of C60 on the Glass Transition Temperature of Carbazole-based Photorefractive Polyphosphazenes

The bi-functional carbazole-based photorefractive polyphosphazenes with different content of C_（60）-doped were fabricated. The glass transition temperature（T_g） of these polymer composite materials was determined using a differential scanning calorimetric（DSC） method. According to the DSC measurement results with different heating rates, the variation of T_g and the active energy of glass transition（E_g） were analyzed in detail. The analysis results indicate that the transition region shifts to higher temperatures with increasing heating rate, and C_（60） content（below 1.0 wt%） can influence the T_g of photorefractive polyphosphazenes. The T_g first increases and then decreases with the C_（60） content（below 1.0 wt%）. The probable causes of the influence of C_（60） on T_g was proposed.

QSPR Study on the Glass Transition Temperature of Polyacrylates

Structural parameters of 22 polyacrylic compounds were computed at two levels using Hartree-Fock and DFT methods. Based on the experimental data of glass transition temperature （Tg）, four-parameter （energy of the lowest unoccupied molecular orbital （ELoMO）, the highest positive charge （Qmax^＋）, dipole moments（μ） and the next highest occupied molecular orbital （ENLOMO）） dependent equations were developed using structural parameters as theoretical descriptors. Especially, Tg dependent equation calculated at the HF/6-31G（d） level is more advantageous than others in view of their correlation and predictive abilities. This dependent equation was validated by variance inflation factors （VIF） and t-test methods.

POLYMER CHAIN DIFFUSION AT A TEMPERATURE BELOW ITS BULK GLASS TRANSITION TEMPERATURE

In this study, it was examined whether the dynamics of polymer chains at a surface is different from that in thebulk, and if so, to what extent they differ in terms of surface glass transition temperature and diffusion coefficient. Obtainedresults clearly indicate that surface chains can travel for a relatively large distance in comparison with the characteristiclength scale of usual segmental motion even at a temperature below its bulk glass transition temperature, T_g^b. This isconsistent with our previous results that the surface glass transition temperature is much lower than the corresponding T_g^b.Also, it was experimentally revealed that there was a gradient of molecular motion in the surface region.

Creep performance of PVC aged at temperature relatively close to glass transition temperature

In order to predict the mechanical performance of the polyvinyl chloride （PVC） at a high operating temperature, a series of short-term tensile creep tests （one- tenth of the physical aging time） of the PVC are carried out at 63 ℃ with a small constant stress by a dynamic mechanical analyzer （DMA）. The Struik-Kohlrausch （SK） formula and Struik shifting methods are used to describe these creep data for various physical aging time. A new phenomenological model based on the multiple relaxation mechanisms of an amorphous polymer is developed to quantitatively characterize the SK parameters （the initial creep compliance, the characteristic retardation time, and the shape factor） determined by the aging time. It is shown that the momentary creep compliance curve of the PVC at 63℃ can be very well fitted by the SK formula for each aging time. However, the SK parameters for the creep curves are not constant during the aging process at the elevated temperatures, and the evolution of these parameters and the creep rate versus aging time curves at the double logarithmic coordinafes have shown a nonlinear phenomenon. Moreover, the creep master curves obtained by the superposition with the Struik shifting methods are unsatisfactory in such a case. Finally, the predicted results calculated from the present model incorporating with the SK formula are in excellent agreement with the creep experimental data for the PVC isothermally aged at the temperature relatively close to the glass transition temperature.

Prediction of Glass Transition Temperatures of Polyarylates Using a Support Vector Machine Model

A three-descriptor quantitative structure-property relationship （QSPR） model, based on the support vector machine （SVM） algorithm, was constructed to predict the glass transition temperatures （Tgs） ofpolyarylates with complex structures. A total of 50 polyarylates were randomly divided into three sets, viz., the training set （30 polymers）, validation set （10 polymers） and prediction set （10 polymers）. By adjusting various parameters by trial and error, the final optimum SVM model based on Austin Model 1 （AM1） calculation is a polynomial kernel with the parameters C of 100, ε of 1.00E-05 and d of 2. The root-mean-square （RMS） errors obtained from the training set, validation set and prediction set are 19.4, 12.8 and 15.5 K, respectively. Research results show that the proposed SVM model has better statistical quality than the previous models. Thus, applying the SVM algorithm to predict Tgs of polymers is feasible.

A NEURAL NETWORK STUDY ON GLASS TRANSITION TEMPERATURE OF POLYMERS

In this paper, an artificial neural network model is adopted to study the glass transition temperature of polymers. In our artificial neural networks, the input nodes are the characteristic ratio C-infinity, the average molecular weight M-e between entanglement points and the molecular weight M-mon of repeating unit. The output node is the glass transition temperature T-g, and the number of the hidden layer is 6. We found that the artificial neural network simulations are accurate in predicting the outcome for polymers for which it is not trained. The maximum relative error for predicting of the glass transition temperature is 3.47%, and the overall average error is only 2.27%. Artificial neural networks may provide some new ideas to investigate other properties of the polymers.

Effect of latex conversion on glass transition temperature

We have synthesized styrene-acrylic latex and investigated the effect of such reaction conditions as the dosage of initiator, surfactant and stirring speed on monomer conversion and glass transition temperature (Tg) of polymer by means of orthogonal experiment, then we get the best reaction conditions. Test results prove that the glass transition temperature of the polymer is directly related to the monomer con- version. The improvement of monomer conver- sion can make the glass transition temperature close to the theoretical value. In the case of high final conversion, we can predict the glass transition temperature of the polymers of different composition according to the theoretical relation effectively.

Molecular Dynamic Simulation Study on Glass Transition Temperature of DGEBA-THPA/SWCNTs Composites

Molecular dynamic (MD) simulations were carried out to predict the thermo-mechanical properties of the cured epoxy network composed of diglycidyl ether bisphenol A (DGEBA) epoxy resin and tetrahydrophthalic anhydride (THPA) curing agent and their single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNT) reinforced the epoxy matrix composites. Different characters such as the density of the materials and mean square displacements (MSDs) were calculated to estimate the glass transition temperatures (Tgs) of of the materials. 365 K and 423 K of the Tgs were obtained respectively, whereas the latter is much higher than the former. The simulation results indicated that the incorporation of SWCNTs in the epoxy matrix can significantly improve the Tg of the cured epoxy. The approach presented in this study is ready to be applied more widely to a large group of candidate polymers and nanofillers.

High temperature strain glass in Ti–Au and Ti–Pt based shape memory alloys

Strain glass is a frozen short-range strain ordered state found in shape memory alloys recently, which exhibits novel properties around the ideal glass transition temperature T_(0). However, the T_(0) of current strain glass systems is still very low, limiting their potential applications and experimental studies. In this paper, we reported two new strain glass systems with relatively high T_(0). In Ti_(50)Au_(50-x)Cr_(x) alloys, the strain glass appears at x = 25, and exhibits a T_(0) of 251 K, while in Ti_(50)Pt_(50-y)Fey alloys, the strain glass takes place at y = 30, and shows a T_(0) of 272 K. Both of them are comparable with the highest T_(0) value reported so far. Moreover, the phase diagrams of main strain glass systems in Ti-based alloys were summarized. It is found that the influence of the martensitic transformation temperature of the host alloy on the T_(0) of the strain glass is limited. This work may help to design new strain glass systems with higher T_(0) above ambient temperature.

Molecular Dynamics Simulation of Glass Transition Behavior of Polyimide Ensemble

The effect of chromophores to the glass transition temperature of polyimide ensemble has been investigated by means of molecular dynamics simulation in conjunction with barrier analysis. Simulated Tg results indicated a good agreement with experimental value. This study showed the MD simulation could estimate the effect of chromophores to the Tg of polyimide ensemble conveniently and an estimation approach method had a surprising deviation of Tg from experiment. At the same time, a polyimide structure with higher barrier energy was designed and validated by MD simulation.

Ratio of dielectric strength of structural and secondary relaxation close to the glass transition for PPGE and DGEBA

Here, dielectric spectroscopy is used in the fre- quency range from 10-2 Hz up to 107 Hz and we found dynamics of the primary α-and intermolecular Johari–Goldstein β-processes are strongly correlated in diglycidyl-ether of bis-phenol-A and poly phenyl glycidyl-ether (PPGE) over a wide temperature from 193 to 345 K and pressure P range from 0.1 to 600 MPa. In contrast with the widespread opinion of statistical independence of these processes the α-β mutual dependence is quantitatively confirmed in [1] analysing the temperature and pressure behavior of the α-and (JG) β-processes the investigation of the ratio of dielectric strength of two processes close to Tg evidence that the importance of secondary dy namics in relaxing external electric stresses increase in glass formers at high pressures with respect to that of the structural relaxation. We suggest that the thermal agitation, acting above Tg is at the basis of the observed result.

Anti-cracking mechanism of diatomite asphalt and diatomite asphalt mixture at low temperature

A kind of neat asphalt and three kinds of diatomite asphalt are tested using differential scanning calorimetry（DSC）. The anti-cracking mechanism of diatomite asphalt is analyzed by DSC and the thermal stress restrained specimen test（TSRST） of the asphalt mixtures. The results show that the low temperature performance of diatomite asphalt is better than that of neat asphalt. The glass transition temperature can reflect the low temperature performance of the diatomite asphalt better and has a good relationship with breaking temperatures. Besides, the TSRST, the bending test, the compressing test and the contraction coefficient test are used to study the low temperature performance of the diatomite asphalt mixture. The results prove that the low temperature performance of the diatomite asphalt mixture is better than that of the neat asphalt mixture. The critical bending strain energy density and the compressing strain energy density of the diatomite asphalt mixture are greater than those of the neat asphalt mixture. After adding diatomite to the asphalt mixture, the contraction coefficient is reduced. Based on the above results, the anti-cracking mechanism of the diatomite asphalt mixture is analyzed from the angle of contraction performance and breaking energy.

Predicting the onset temperature（Tg） of GexSe1-x glass transition: a feature selection based two-stage support vector regression method

Despite the usage of both experimental and topological methods, realizing a rapid and accurate measurement of the onset temperature(Tg ) of GexSe1-xglass transition remains an open challenge. In this paper, a predictive model for the Tg in GexSe1-xglass system is presented by a machine learning method named feature selection based two-stage support vector regression(FSTS-SVR). Firstly, Pearson correlation coefficient(PCC) is used to select features highly correlated with Tg from the candidate features of GexSe1-x glass system. Secondly, in order to simulate the two-stage characteristic of Tg which is caused by structural variation with a turning point at x = 0.33 via the structural analysis, SVR is utilized to build predictive models for two stages separately and then the two achieved models are synthesized using a minimum error based model for Tg prediction. Compared with the topological and other methods based on SVR, the FSTS-SVR gives the highest predictive accuracy with the root mean square error(RMSE) and mean absolute percentage error(MAPE) of 10.64 K and 2.38%, respectively. This method is also expected to be more efficient for the prediction of Tg of other glass systems with the multi-stage characteristic.

Understanding the alkyl effect of geminal dinitropropyl ester energetic plasticizers on hydroxyl terminated polybutadiene(HTPB):Simultaneous tuning on low temperature behavior and processability

Geminal dinitropropyl ester plasticizers(DNPEPs) possess excellent energetic performances which provide good potentials as insensitive plasticizer. In this study, we design and synthesize DNPEPs with different alkane chain parts, and systematically investigate their structure-property relationships.Results show that DNPEPs have impact sensitivities all higher than 25.2 J, thermal decomposition temperatures all higher than 254 ℃, and glass transition temperatures(T_(g)) lower than-90 ℃.Furthermore, the effects of DNPEPs as plasticizer are studied on hydroxyl terminated polybutadiene(HTPB) in detail, including the viscosity, glass transition temperatures and others. It is noteworthy that 2,2-dinitropropyl nonanoate(DNPNc) among these DNPEPs exhibits the most expected simultaneous tuning effects on both viscosity and T_(g) of HTPB systems, providing favorable potentials to replace the conventional plastizers as dioctyl sebacate(DOS) in the HTPB based propellants and explosives.

Low Temperature Heat Capacities and Thermodynamic Properties of Zinc L-Threonate Zn(C_4H_7O_5)_2(s) by Adiabatic Calorimetry

Low-temperature heat capacities of the solid compound Zn（C4H7O5）2（s） were measured in a temperature range from 78 to 374 K, with an automated adiabatic calorimeter. A solid-to-solid phase transition occurred in the temperature range of 295？322 K. The peak temperature, the enthalpy, and entropy of the phase transition were determined to be （316.269±1.039） K, （11.194±0.335） kJ？mol-1, and （35.391±0.654） J？K-1？mol-1, respectively. The experimental values of the molar heat capacities in the temperature regions of 78？295 K and 322？374 K were fitted to two polynomial equations of heat capacities（Cp,m） with reduced temperatures（X） and [X = f（T）], with the help of the least squares method, respectively. The smoothed molar heat capacities and thermodynamic functions of the compound, relative to that of the standard reference temperature 293.15 K, were calculated on the basis of the fitted polynomials and tabulated with an interval of 5 K. In addition, the possible mechanism of thermal decomposition of the compound was inferred by the result of TG-DTG analysis.

Mixed Alkali-zinc Effects on Thermo-mechanical Properties in Borosilicate Glasses

A series of mixed alkali-zinc borosilicate glasses with various r values(r=molar ratio of[ZnO]/([R^(2)O]+[ZnO]))from 0.00 to 1.00 were fabricated to probe the mixed alkali-zinc effects on thermo-mechanical properties.The nonlinear evolution of glass transition temperature(T_(g))with the addition of ZnO is ascribed to the competition of two converse factors,i e,the T_(g)depression as one of the colligative properties for a solution,on the one hand,and the enhancement of T_(g)due to the higher field strength of zinc cations compared to that of alkali ions.However,the nonlinear evolution of elastic moduli and coefficients of thermal expansion with r is attributed to the variance of intermediate-range clusters,which is confirmed by infrared and Raman scattering spectra.These findings are very helpful in tailoring the performance of borosilicate glasses.

Research on the Glass Transition Temperature and Mechanical Properties of Poly(vinyl chloride)/Dioctyl Phthalate (PVC/DOP) Blends by Molecular Dynamics Simulations

To effectively improve the performance and expand the applications of polymers, molecular dynamics(MD) simulations with the COMPASS force field have been applied to predict the miscibility, glass transition temperature(Tg), and mechanical properties of poly(vinyl chloride)/dioctyl phthalate(PVC/DOP) blends. The solubility parameter values obtained are in good agreement with the reference data and the little difference(|Δδ|< 2.0 MPa0.5) between two components indicates that PVC/DOP is a miscible system. Tg is predicted by the slope of the free volume and density versus temperature simulation data based on density and free volume theory which is agree well with the experimental data. In addition, the analyses of mechanical properties results indicate that the values of Young’s modulus(E), bulk modulus(K), and shear modulus(G) decrease with the addition of DOP, demonstrating that the rigidity of material is weakened and the ductility is improved. The mechanical properties can also be effectively improved by increasing the temperature, which may provide a more flexible mixture, with lower E, K, G but an increased ductility.

THE GLASS TRANSITION TEMPERATURE AND MICROSTRUCTURE OF POLYURETHANE/EPOXY RESIN INTERPENETRATING POLYMER NETWORKS NANOCOMPOSITES

Nanocomposites with various contents of organophilic montmorillonite (oMMT) have been prepared by adding oMMT to interpenetrating poly- mer networks (IPNs) of polyurethane and epoxy resin (PU/EP) which had been prepared by a sequential polymeric technique. DSC experiment indicates a novel phenomenon that the glass transition tem- perature (Tg) of the nanocomposites increases with the oMMT content up to 3 %, then decreases with further increasing oMMT content. In order to explain this phenomenon, crosslink density, hydrogen bond- ing in the hard segments, crystallization of the nanocomposites and the exfoliation degree of oMMT in the nanocomposites have been investigated by swelling method, FT-IR, XRD, SEM and TEM, re- spectively. The results indicate that the crosslink density and the hydrogen bonding index of the nanocomposites increase, but the crystallization de- gree of the nanocomposites decreases with increas- ing oMMT content. In addition, oMMT improves the network structure of PU/EP.